WW3 Writing Workshop Worksheet(3)
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Wednesday’s Writing Workshop (WW) #3 Worksheet
INSTRUCTIONS
: Use this worksheet to save your submission for the final portfolio project. Blackboard does NOT
allow extensions on WWs or peer review assignments. Peer reviews are assigned immediately after the WW due date/time expires. Mark your calendar/submit early.
This is a 3-part assignment
: the WW submission, self/peer reviews, and summary discussion thread. If you miss the WW due date, Blackboard will not assign peer reviews.
The following questions are in the WW#3 assignment on Blackboard. I highly recommend writing responses to each question in this Word doc and then copying and pasting them into the question comment boxes on Blackboard. Answer the prompts with correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation. Use the “Save” option while working. Press “Submit” AFTER all questions have been answered. Editing may not be available once you press “Submit” in the last question. Be careful not to submit your WW before you’re done!
Questions 1-3 are complete/incomplete (1 point for complete and 0 points for incomplete).
Question 1 State your preferred name and pronouns in the response box so your peers will know how to address you in their feedback.
Rubric scoring: 1 point = complete; 0 points = incomplete
My preferred name is Daniela and my pronouns are she/her.
Question 2 Review the posted PDFs posted in the modules before beginning this assignment: "Entering Class Discussions" and "Reading for the Conversation." Choose one video from any lecture folder and respond with the template below. (Fill in the blanks: if you want to add more of your own opinion or change up the words of the template, good!
Simply make sure all of the fill-in-the-blank points in the template below are addressed in your submission to receive full credit).
{Paragraph 1}
In the video ________________, a controversial issue has been whether ________________. On the one hand, some argue that ________________. From this perspective, ________________.
{Paragraph 2}
On the other hand, however, others argue that ________________. In the words of ________________, one of this view’s main proponents, “ ________________.” According to this view, ________________.
{Paragraph 3}
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In sum, then, the issue is whether ________________ or ________________. My own view is that
________________. Though I concede that ________________, I still maintain that ________________.
{Paragraph 4}
For example, ________________. Although some might object that ________________, I would reply that ________________. The issue is important because ________________.
Rubric scoring: 1 point = complete; 0 points = incomplete
In the video “Texas May Have The Worst Gerrymander In The Country”, Nathaniel Rakich from
FiveThirtyEight explains how bad gerrymandering affects the state of Texas and how it’s one of the worst gerrymandered states. The recent re-districting of Texas has left almost no competitive districts in the state and has unfairly leaned towards giving more power to Republicans. Under this map, Republicans are expected to win 15% more seats or almost 6 extra US House seats which unfairly represents the majority of the population that lives in urban areas. Given that Texas’ population is rapidly increasing year by year and a lot of that rising population is almost 50% from Latinos the gerrymandering done in Texas is not only partisan but also racial. I concede that this is a big problem in Texas and is going to take a lot of work to fight this gerrymandering. If the only way to change the district lines won’t be until perhaps another federal election, then it might be too late because Republicans keep changing and re-drawing district lines to their benefit. But also, I have to add that perhaps advances in technology such as simulated redistricting can help find and identify partisan and racial gerrymandering’s “deviations from state legislatures’ traditional districting criteria, which could include compactness, contiguity, equal population, preservation of existing political boundaries, number of majority-minority districts, and any other permissible factors” (Menter, 2021).
Resources
Menter. (2021). Calculated Discrimination: Exposing Racial Gerrymandering Using Computational Methods.
The Columbia Science and Technology Law Review
,
22
(2), 346–382. https://doi.org/10.52214/stlr.v22i2.8669
Though I concede that -----, I still maintain that -------.
For example, ---------. Although some might object that ----------, I would reply that --------------------. The issue is important because -------------------.
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Question 3 Choose one article from any article folder and respond with the template below. (Fill in the blanks: if you want to add more of your own opinion or change up the words of the template, good!
Simply make sure all of the fill-in-the-blank points in the template below are addressed in your submission to receive full credit).
{Paragraph 1}
In the article ________________, a controversial issue has been whether ________________. On the one hand, some argue that ________________. From this perspective, ________________.
{Paragraph 2}
On the other hand, however, others argue that ________________. In the words of ________________, one of this view’s main proponents, “ ________________.” According to this view, ________________.
{Paragraph 3}
In sum, then, the issue is whether ________________ or ________________. My own view is that
________________. Though I concede that ________________, I still maintain that ________________.
{Paragraph 4}
For example, ________________. Although some might object that ________________, I would reply that ________________. The issue is important because ________________.
Rubric scoring: 1 point = complete; 0 points = incomplete
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Wednesday’s Writing Workshop (WW) #3 Worksheet
Question 4 Now that we've read, One Person, No Vote, it's time to summarize the reading. Use the default template as well as the following criteria:
Paraphrase what you learned from the book. Write in your own words
. Review the plagiarism consequences in the Welcome Module. All writing should be in your own voice and with your own thoughts and words.
Write 1-3 paragraphs for each chapter of the book. Remember, essay paragraphs should have a minimum of three to five sentences.
Use quotes from the reader sparingly, if at all. This is about what you learned, and your voice is the most important part of this assignment.
If using a quote, cite in APA style for in-line citations and include the reference section at the end of the paper.
This is your perspective. Back up your perspective with evidence though. Analyze what you learned, paraphrase it (They say). Write what you agree with specifically (I concede). Then write what you disagree with (But). Any claims you make MUST also include evidence and citations to back up your opinion.
Address the following when using the default template as a guide and separate your paragraphs by chapter using the following prompts:
1.
What is the foreword about? (They say...)
2.
In each chapter, what does the author say they believe? (They say...)
3.
In each chapter, what did the author want the reader to understand? (They say...)
4.
In each chapter, what did you agree with? (I concede...)
5.
What do you disagree with from each chapter? Why? (But...)
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6.
What empirical evidence do you have to support what you believe? Cite sources in APA 7 style.
7.
What is the Afterword about? (They say...)
8.
Conclude your paper with the following: After reading One Person, No Vote, what is your perspective from a journalist's point of view? If you had to report on the elections in Texas this year with the knowledge you have from the book and posted articles and videos, what would you write or say to the general public? Use the following as your beginning prompt: As a reporter (or journalist), I would...
Rubric Scoring for Question 4:
*All questions will have feedback and scores.
Score "3" if all chapters were discussed and the default template was used in each response for each chapter.
Score "2" if a minimum of three or more chapters were discussed and the default template was used in each response.
Score "1" if one to two chapters were discussed and the default template was used in each response.
In the foreword of One Person, No Vote
, Senator Dick Durbin synthesizes Carol Anderson’s last book White Rage
which explains race politics from the Civil War to current times and parallels her new book to that one. He says that as in One Person, No Vote
, Anderson then focuses on a very important racial issue that was touched upon in White Rage
: the right to vote. He gives a few examples of how the Republican Party has disenfranchised thousands of citizens and how voter suppression affects minorities, particularly Black citizens. He talks about how Republican legislators, under the threat of so-called “voter fraud”, have created voter ID laws, reduced voting places, used gerrymandering, and used the census to restrict and discourage citizens to vote, particularly those that are not likely to vote for them (i.e., minorities, the young, and poor people).
In the first chapter of the book, “A History of Disfranchisement”, Carol Anderson chronicles the history and methods of voter disenfranchisement since the Reconstruction years after the slaves were freed to demonstrate how voter suppression isn’t a new thing. The way the Republican party enacts voter suppression nowadays is similar but subtler to the way Black voters were treated during the Jim Crow era all until the creation of the Voting Rights Act in 1965. Anderson also tells how voter suppression was continued after the Voting Rights Act was passed but in different and subtler (and sometimes more cruel) ways. She says all of these things were foundational to the gutting of the VRA in 2013, which influenced drastically how the election of 2016 would go seeing as it was the first federal election in 50 years to happen without
the VRA’s protections. Anderson very clearly explains how decades of voter suppression are foundational and necessary to understand where we are today in politics and why minorities have
been attacked by the Republican party by stripping them of their voting rights. I concede that it is necessary to know the past to understand the future and how it affected the
2016 election but also I would like to add that there has now been proof that not only was voter suppression a factor but Russian interference in the 2016 elections was also a cause. As William Aceves (2019) explains, Russian operatives created hundreds of social media accounts making themselves pass as Americans to influence minorities, particularly Black voters, to abstain from voting in the 2016 elections. These operatives “used inaccurate and 5
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misleading information in a coordinated campaign to manipulate public opinion and disrupt the political process”. They not only talked about race issues and stoked division to encourage minorities not to vote claiming they cared about racial injustice but, on the other hand, they also posted different perspectives that belittled the social justice movement. They would use this propaganda to influence the masses and misinform on both sides of politics.
In chapter two, “Voter ID”, Anderson talks about the voter ID laws that were introduced in GOP-governed states by asking for very restricted methods of ID which a lot of minorities and poor people do not own. They also make it harder for people to be able to even get a proper ID and they’ve removed DMV offices from the places closest to the affected. Anderson wants us to understand the number of barriers Republicans place to make sure that voters cannot enact their right to vote. All of these strict voter ID laws come from Republicans stoking fear of “voter fraud” when there is much evidence to the contrary. By gutting the VRA, many of the states that were under preclearance also no longer had to ask permission to pass these voter ID laws and those states enacted even more strict laws than other states. For example, North Carolina’s voter ID law very intentionally targeted Black citizens and so they gathered information about what types of ID Black voters didn’t have and made that type of ID be the only one allowed to vote. I concede that these voter ID laws will not help in supposed cases of “voter fraud” because most if any are non-consequential and not harmful. Instead, these voter ID laws suppressed the amount of voter turnout that was growing in each state. Given that we elected Barack Obama, a Black man, to the highest position in the United States, the Republicans worked hard so that many minorities, especially Black people, would not be able to vote ever again. But also, I want to add that the way to combat these voter ID laws is for state legislatures to challenge and overturn them. To do that, there would have to be honest representatives that work
with electorates to ensure every vote of every person counts. For example, as Will Hyland (2021)
writes, the way the state of Washington quickly gave a solution in response to North Dakota’s strict voter ID law that directly impacted Native Americans. Native Americans live in reservations; hence they don’t have a street address, and North Dakota had passed a voter ID law
that required that everyone must have a street address in their voter registration and ID. Washington in response to the law then quickly enacted the Native American Voting Rights Act in which Native Americans were allowed to “submit a "non-traditional" address, such as a PO box, on their voter registration applications, allowing a federally recognized tribe to use a tribal government building as the residential/mailing address for people living on the reservation”. But this was only done as quickly as it was because it was coming directly from the state legislature which passed the bill without a problem.
In chapter three, “Voter Roll Purge”, Anderson explains another method of voter suppression
and how the Republican party has purged thousands and thousands of voter rolls within Black groups and other minorities. After the 1988 election’s poor voter turnout, states made it easier to get proper identification by going to the DMV. Of course, that also had its own problems as most
Black-majority towns only had maybe one DMV office for thousands of people and transportation to those offices was scarce.
In response to the Motor Voter law then the GOP created a plan to make it harder for registered voters. They demanded routine maintenance of voter rolls and in the hands of GOP-
controlled states it made them capable of purging thousands of voter rolls because of small errors
and they rarely if ever informed voters of it. The Exact Match program then caused many problems among registered Black, Latino, and Asian voters because it demanded that their 6
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Wednesday’s Writing Workshop (WW) #3 Worksheet
registration information, particularly their names, was exactly as it was on voter IDs. The problem was with foreign names such as Latino citizens where officials maybe intentionally wouldn’t write their correct names in their identification and so it didn’t 100% match with their voter registration names and placed them erroneously in voter rolls to be purged. Another way that the Republican party triggers voter rolls to be purged is if voters haven’t voted in the last elections, even if they only skipped the last federal election. Abstaining from voting is a right just like voting itself is if it is by choice and not purposefully because of voter suppression. Thousands of citizens’ names then were purged and they only find out until they want to go to vote that they can’t because they have been purged from voter registration rolls.
I concede that it is shameful how the Republican party keeps adding more and more obstacles for citizens to register to vote because they know that they won’t vote for the GOP. It’s
shameful how they specifically target Black, Latino, and other minorities with voter suppression and use the census to gather data that will be helpful to be able to purge registered voters from voter rolls. And it’s specifically shameful how the GOP always does this in response to higher voter turnouts in Black, Latino, and Asian populations. But also, I would like to add that the more the GOP purges voter rolls the more the population gets angry, and the more they will become involved in resolving these issues and mobilize and boost participation, as we have seen in the 2018 midterm elections. The more people can understand and discover “threats to group identity can powerfully trigger anger, and anger can powerfully mobilize participation” (Valentino, N.A., & Neuner, F.G., 2017).
In chapter four, “Rigging the Rules”, Anderson explains the ways the GOP has used gerrymandering, both racial and partisan, to redraw district lines again and again to their benefit. Racial gerrymandering benefits an all-white power of the state and targets urban areas whose population is quickly developing and is where a majority of minorities live and corrals all of those into one district that gains very few electoral votes, therefore the votes of minorities don’t matter. Partisan gerrymandering is also racial because even though this type of gerrymandering is mostly about maintaining the party in power, it is always done in GOP-controlled states and therefore it also targets minorities that are likely not going to vote for those in power.
Gerrymandering has also been in practice since the 19
th
century and is the most persistent and
pervasive form of voter suppression that still exists nowadays. There are also many other methods of rigging the rules, like closing poll stations which creates long lines that a lot of people cannot wait in because they have other jobs.
I concede that gerrymandering is perhaps the most harmful of voter suppression methods since it is entirely out of citizens’ hands and only state legislators and lawmakers can fix the mess of re-districting. Sometimes the GOP will go so far as to gerrymander a state so badly that each district’s shape is amorphous and undistinguishable on a map. But also, I would like to add that in recent years there have been advances in technology to be able to help detect gerrymandering in districts by using simulated redistricting. Simulated redistricting algorithms are making it possible to “identify deviations from state legislatures’ traditional districting criteria, which could include compactness, contiguity, equal population, preservation of existing political boundaries, number of majority-minority districts, and any other permissible factors” (Menter, 2021).
In chapter five, “The Resistance”, Anderson talks about how a tough special election in Alabama was won by Democrat senator Doug Jones against Republican Judge Roy Moore and how local organizations, particularly the Black Belt movement, and other local Black groups, 7
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mobilized to help many disenfranchised citizens to not only register to vote but also driving them
to vote. I concede that it is rather important to give credit to local Black organizations, churches, and activist groups in Alabama for the win of Senator Jones and how important it is to invest in local organizations that work specifically to help people register to vote. It is good to see that these types of local organizations have been growing and more and more states are growing their own organizations to help mobilize and boost election participation.
But also, it is important to note that Roy Moore’s own sex scandal helped sway the votes from the Republican candidate to Senator Jones. But this could have not been done without the reporters and victims who came forward and had evidence and strong claims of the sexual harassment from Moore to these then minors. Black churches, with the help of the grassroots organization Woke Vote, also organized “120 ‘face captains’ who could interact with worshippers directly and reached an estimated 300,000 people” (Smith, 2017)
In the conclusion, Anderson explains how Russian operatives misinformed people online by making themselves pass as American liberals and conservatives stoking division and encouraging minorities not to vote in the 2016 election. The election process was compromised, and Russian operatives simply used our weaknesses against us and used the anger minorities had toward voter suppression to encourage people not to vote because their votes don’t count anyway. Some states are however improving and making it easier to vote. There’s the implementation of the Automatic Voter Registration (AVR) program, which automatically registers citizens when they apply for or renew their driver’s license at the DMV. There are also people working to
expand access to ballots and fund early voting sites so that people will be able to vote early.
In the afterword, Anderson continues writing about the advances that have been made through mobilization in states where voter suppression is harmful. For example, many districts in
states like North Dakota, Georgia, and Texas sued their state legislatures to fight off various methods of voter suppression such as the need for Native Americans in North Dakota to have a street address in their registration information (a thing that is hard to do since Native Americans live in reservations). After the work of organizations, particularly local Black groups, to mobilize
citizens to vote we saw the highest voter turnout in 2018 since 1914. In conclusion, as a journalist, I would use this very well-researched book to arm myself with facts to understand the current elections and would report on them and remind people about voter
suppression and why voter turnouts are so low. Because if you don’t also report on voter suppression you are placing the blame solely on voters and are doing a terrible job of accurately reporting what’s happening. The more people know about voter suppression the more they will want to mobilize and participate in elections because they don’t like threats to their voting rights.
Voter suppression, in all types of methods, is wrong and we should all work to eradicate it from the country forever. Until then, we won’t really be free.
References
Aceves. (2019). Virtual Hatred: How Russia Tried to Start a Race War in the United States. Michigan Journal of Race & Law
, 24.2, 177–. https://doi.org/10.36643/mjrl.24.2.virtual
Hyland. (2021). VOTER ID: COMBATING VOTER FRAUD OR DISENFRANCHISING? A COMPREHENSIVE ANALYSIS OF VOTER ID LAWS, NATIVE AMERICAN 8
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DISENFRANCHISEMENT, AND THEIR INTERSECTION. International and Comparative Law Review
, 29(1), 283–.
Menter. (2021). Calculated Discrimination: Exposing Racial Gerrymandering Using Computational Methods.
The Columbia Science and Technology Law Review
,
22
(2), 346–382. https://doi.org/10.52214/stlr.v22i2.8669
Smith, David. (2017). ‘A Perfect Storm’: How Liberal Millennials and African Americans Delivered a Stunning Alabama Result. The
Guardian
. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/dec/16/alabama-senate-election-doug-jones-roy-
moore-donald-trump
Valentino, N. A., & Neuner, F. G. (2017). Why the Sky Didn’t Fall: Mobilizing Anger in Reaction to Voter ID Laws.
Political Psychology
,
38
(2), 331–350. https://doi-
org.ezproxy.lib.uh.edu/10.1111/pops.12332
Important Communication Guidelines for Peer Evaluations & Discussion Forums
1.
Welcome multiple viewpoints
Speak from your own experience by using “I statements.” Ask questions to understand the sources of disagreements.
2. Own your intentions and your impacts
Respect each other’s experiences and feelings by taking responsibility for the effects of your words. On the other side, if you have a strong reaction to something, let the individual and/or the discussion group know. Be open to dialogue. Respect everyone.
3. Work to recognize your privileges
Use this space to recognize and investigate your privileges (for example: class, gender, sexual orientation,
ability). Honor the different experiences we all bring to this space. Recognize and acknowledge the value of multiple cultures and experiences.
4. Take risks: Lean into discomfort
We are all in process. Challenge yourself to contribute even if it is not perfectly formulated. Reflect and share understanding that we all contribute to knowledge.
5. Step back
Encourage those who have not spoken to share their thoughts and opinions.
6. Notice and name group dynamics in the moment
We are all responsible for this course's peer review and discussions forums. Be aware of how others are responding or not responding. Ask for dialogue if needed.
7. Actively listen
Use your energy to listen to what is said before thinking about how to respond. Notice when defensiveness and denial arise. Question how you are reacting to messages.
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Wednesday’s Writing Workshop (WW) #3 Worksheet
8. Challenging with care
Find ways to respectfully challenge others and be open to challenges of your own views. Think about how to question ideas without personal attacks.
9. Confidentiality
Share your own summary of the message, not exact wording or the messenger. All messages are confidential in this course. If a student is found sharing screenshots or posts, it will result in an "F" and the student will be dropped from the course.
10. Break it down
Use simple language and background information when necessary. Ask for clarification if needed. If quoting others, cite your work. Read the syllabus regarding plagiarism.
Modified from © AWARE-LA www.awarela.org
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